DuckSouth.com

MSU relies on one-man tape library to get full picture of unfamiliar opponents

By Ian R. Rapoport
irapopor@clarionledger.com

The Clarion-Ledger

First up for MSU

What: No. 9 Mississippi State vs. No. 8 Stanford

Where: Charlotte, N.C.

When: Friday, 8:55 p.m. CST

TV: CBS

Tickets: 704-894-2943

STARKVILLE — On Selection Sunday, the NCAA Tournament brackets flash on TV. That's how Mississippi State knew it was playing Stanford in the opening round.

Almost instantaneously, the mad dash to prepare begins.

Somehow, between Sunday night and Friday night in Charlotte, N.C., the Bulldogs need to get ready. To thoroughly scout their opponent, they need tapes. Not just a few. But lots and lots of tapes. They need a source, a library of Stanford game tapes.

For years, that's what they have had.

"I'm the library," said Chip Boes of Championship Basketball Enterprises in Pensacola.

Boes records all the games on TV from early January until Selection Sunday, then distributes them to coaches like MSU's Rick Stansbury for a fee at tournament time.

"It's all a time issue at this point, to get tapes beginning at 5:30 on a Sunday night," he said. "We provide everything coaches request."

With a small window of time to scout an opponent teams might never see on TV, Boes' service is a gold mine for coaches. Members of Stansbury's staff picked up that stack of golden tapes on Monday.

It's not the team's only resource.

Bennie Ashford, MSU's coordinator of electronic media, has been recording every game on ESPN and on satellite TV since the postseason conference tournaments.

"It makes our recycle bin really big," Ashford said. "It's been thousands of tapes."

The goal was to be ready regardless of how visible or invisible the opponent is.

So while Stansbury said on Monday morning that he "hadn't had a chance to form an opinion on Stanford yet," and MSU All-American Lawrence Roberts said, "I don't know anything about them. I don't have a clue," you can bet that all changed when they watched their tapes.

While Mississippi State is one of Boes' "traditional" clients, there are others. The former coach and current middle school assistant principal moonlighting as a tape guru estimates that 30-35 percent of the teams in the NCAA Tournament utilize his yearly stash of roughly 750 games tapes.

"Coach Stansbury and other coaches rely very heavily on videotapes for scouting," Boes said. "And I have more tapes than anyone in history."

Boes began running a scouting service, hiring out basketball minds to compile written scouting reports on college teams. But when the NCAA outlawed on-site scouting for coaches, he adapted. Now, he runs a tape business.

That's why he was at the Pensacola Regional Airport at 4 a.m. Monday with "bundles and bundles" of tapes for any number of coaches in the NCAA and NIT tournaments.

It's a responsibility that Boes takes seriously. He cites reliability as a reason his business has climbed with no advertising. Coaches learn of him through word-of-mouth. His favorite part of his job is watching March Madness, seeing a client win and saying, "That's my team."

Boes is protective of his hobby, too. He declined to discuss how many tapes a team requested, how much each tape costs, and or even give a rough estimate of different requests a team may make.

"I don't want a team to lose and have people say, 'Well, he requested only 22 tapes," Boes said. "He should've gotten 23."

Ashford provides the basketball staff with tapes through a similar grinding process.

He regularly has basketball tapes in and out of VCRs for more than 14 hours a day. His just-in-case attitude makes him indispensable.

For instance Ashford and his staff stayed all four days at the SEC Tournament in Atlanta, taping every game even though State lost the second day.

The earliest Mississippi State can play an SEC team in the NCAA Tournament is Kentucky in the Austin Regional finals.

And State, thanks to Boes and Ashford, will now be prepared for any team that comes its way

now all we need is someone to control gary ervin and help marcus campbell and we'll be fine!!!!!

Latest I'm hearing from starkville is that Sharpe is done.....transfering possibly to UAB. He's constantly missed practices and meetings.....and it's cost him dearly.

he's not making the trip to play against stanford... he sounds like he's not mature..... he has a prolems being places on time or getting there at all... stans told the kid to lay off the bong.. buuutttt!!!!!!!

Sharpe never wanted to be in Starkcrap in the first place.

His HS school coach was bought.

Sorry to hear that about him...could have been a better fit somewhere he wanted to go.

Oh, and before you crybabies go off on rant, remember that 3 teams pulled their scholarship offers for the kid right before he signed with M$U.

Yes webb, you are correct. His hs coach was bought...........by bama. But Sharpe went opposite of what his coach was telling him to do. Schools pull scholly offers all the time when the realize the player has no interest in them............duh.......... He thought at state they he'd take it easy this season until all the sr's left and they he'd start working on his game..........not under stansbury you won't. It wasn't that bad at first, until he started rubbing off on Rhodes...getting him into the same trouble.

Greenhead22 wrote:Yes webb, you are correct. His hs coach was bought...........by bama. But Sharpe went opposite of what his coach was telling him to do. Schools pull scholly offers all the time when the realize the player has no interest in them............duh.......... He thought at state they he'd take it easy this season until all the sr's left and they he'd start working on his game..........not under stansbury you won't. It wasn't that bad at first, until he started rubbing off on Rhodes...getting him into the same trouble.

You know, it's funny that you say that. But you are dead wrong. In fact, I recall this thread:
http://www.ducksouth.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?t=10448&highlight=sharpe
(speaking of funny-- this one is filled with laughs...all that expense of your posse of M$U nitwits ... If there was ever a time I put some in their place, you'll find it there)

But anyway, back to topic.

There is a link in there with the HS coach. Don't know if its still up or not. That should put to rest any doubts about where the coach wanted him to go.

It's a little late in the game and way off base for you to even insinuate that his recruitment was dirty by Bama. There is a big difference between pulling an offer when there is no interest and pulling an offer with 2 other schools because the kid suddenly pulled a switcharoo out of nowhere. Schools dont publicly pull offers that late in the recruiting game unless they are trying to draw attention to dirty play.

S*cks for the kid...I won't debate this any further because its all water under the bridge.

As for Stansbury steak, he sure does get hyped alot around here...I guess you guys are expecting big things out of him this week.

edit: that link is not up anymore. I'm sure there are plenty of articles that follwo the recruitment of the kid if you feel like researching. I'm not interested...but it is funny to hear anyone say we cheated when the kid signed with M$U. Thats funny. You do realize what you are saying?

Gottfried told Sharpe that he would redshirt his frosh year. Sharpe's mom said no, he will not. Stans went after Sharpe late because we thought Roberts was going pro. The 3 schools that pulled the scholarships all wanted him to redshirt, which he wasn't going to do. Yes, Stans told him that he would get alot of playing time his frosh yr........contingent to doing what he wants him to do.....in the gym, and in the classroom, which he's done neither all season. He wouldn't have seen the floor this yr at bama, with davis and davidson in the middle.

And while we are talking about people getting bought off how about you feel me in on the $$$ that Winston received to come back this yr from a booster. I know about 90% of the deal that went down, thought since you have such great knowledge of bummer and everything that takes place in the ath dept you could fill in the last 10%. And before you go to spouting off that it didn't happen, most of my family lives in the tuscalooser area and have ties with the ath dept so I'm in the know.

Gottfried told Sharpe that he would redshirt his frosh year.

No he didn't. But it sounds good. Almost as good as the 3 schools saying the same thing. You mean to tell me Georgia and UAB were telling him redshirt? Have you seen their depth charts (remember Jim Harrick?)

We can go back and forth all day if you'd like over this but actions speak louder than words. All the he said-she said is over and done with. Those schools involved all knew something fishy was going on. Coaches can't exactly go public and say it (NCAA rules), but 3 schools all following suit by pulling back offers speaks volumes.

I'm officially done with Sharpe. Sounds like he's done. Can't say I blame the kid. Maybe he came to his senses and realized how big of a dump Starkville is, not to mention that Stansfield isn't that great of a coach afterall.

As for Winston, I'm not really sure how much he got paid. I never realized you were an "insider" to the Alabama athletic department. Not to mention you have family there? Wowza!!! Tell me, are you flexing your internet muscles or have you been hanging out on too many M$U message boards searching for dirt on a player who has taken your sorry ass team to the cleaners twice in the past months.

Maybe you should report all your findings to the NCAA? Afterall, you have family in Tuscaloosa!

While your at it, see if you can find out how much Lawrence Roberts and Mario Ausitn were paid to stay. Then we can see which booster has the most money!

BTW, I'm not here to pick a fight with you GH. In fact, I like your savvy. You seem very knowledgeable for the most part on sports. You also know how to get under your rivals skin...and I like that.

KIDS, gotta lov'em

weedmaster do you masterbate to a ms logo ???????

Sharpe threw a punch at Shane Power at practice so his booty his gone.